Jiàngnáng Cuōyào 絳囊撮要
Essentials Drawn from the Crimson-Bag by 雲川道人 (Yúnchuān Dàoren, fl. 1744; Qiánlóng-era literatus-physician)
About the work
A short Qiánlóng-era clinical formulary in 1 juǎn, presenting carefully-selected “essentials” from the compiler’s accumulated experience and the standard formulary canon. The title-image is the crimson medicine-bag (jiàngnáng — the physician’s traditional silken pouch for carrying drugs) and the gathering of pinches (cuōyào — the selection of one’s best material): a self-effacing trope characteristic of late-Imperial jīngyàn fāng compilers. The formulary’s clinical scope covers internal medicine (the opening section is Nèikē with Niúdǎnxīng wán for juénì / sudden faints), surgery, gynaecology, and paediatrics.
Prefaces
Self-Preface (zìxù), Qiánlóng 9, jiǎzǐ, mid-summer 13th day = 1744, 6th-lunar-month 13th, signed Yúnchuān Dàoren 云川道人 at the Píngcuì shānfáng 萍翠山房 (“Duckweed-Green Mountain-Cottage”).
The preface develops an unusually philosophical justification for the formulary’s compilation. Its argument:
“Among things, what is líng (numinous)? Man is líng. And where does that líng reside? It resides in the ěr (ears — the cipher / aperture). The ěr are the means by which the hòutiān (acquired / posterior heaven) ties back into the xiāntiān (prior heaven). The xiāntiān has língmíng (numinous luminosity) as its master; the hòutiān has xuèqì (blood and qì) as its functioning. If the functioning does not flow, then língmíng will be choked off as well. — On this account, the XuānQí [= the medical] house has felt pity: they consider that the xiāntiān is not established because the hòutiān has lost its functioning. Xuèqì: when they reach proper-and-level (zhèngpíng), they have functioning; when they lose proper-and-level, they have no functioning. To return them from no-functioning to proper-functioning, one cannot do without qióngzhī yáocǎo (the precious-mushroom and the jasper-herb). But qióngzhī yáocǎo are not what one can quickly obtain in this world.
“Failing that, one falls back on the next-best: those who use tree-roots and grass-skins for the work of preservation. Now tree-roots and grass-skins are the products of the Heaven-and-Earth língxiù (numinous-and-superior)-essence — but each tree-root has one nature-and-flavour, each grass-skin has one nature-and-flavour. Not handled well, they fall to one or the other extreme — what is too rigid is not tempered by what is too yielding, what is too yielding is not invigorated by what is too rigid. — Handled well, the rigid is balanced by the yielding, the yielding by the rigid; that there is anything that has reached proper-and-level and yet found no rebirth in this — I have not yet heard.”
The preface then sets a scene with a visitor (kè) at the Píngcuì shānfáng who asks how one is to obtain the zhèngpíng zhī liángjì (the well-proportioned good prescriptions). The compiler answers: “It is not difficult. — As the saying goes: ‘Although the drug issues from the physician’s hand, the formula is mostly transmitted from the ancients.’ Take only those that the XuānQí house has already tested in the world, and announce them broadly to colleagues — would not the result be one stroke and ten-thousand goods together arriving?’ The visitor responded: ‘Shìshì’ (Yes, yes). I therefore took from the Jiàngnáng (crimson bag) one fascicle of essentials and handed it to the visitor…”
Abstract
A precisely-dated mid-Qiánlóng (1744) clinical formulary by the Daoist literatus-physician Yúnchuān Dàoren (“Cloud-River Daoist”). The compiler’s hào identifies him as a Daoist-affiliated retired or amateur scholar; no securely-identified secular name is recorded for him. The preface’s philosophical apparatus — xiāntiān / hòutiān, língmíng / xuèqì, qióngzhī yáocǎo — is consistent with Daoist medical metaphysics of the nèidān (inner-alchemy) tradition, and indicates the compiler’s broader doctrinal alignment.
The preface’s image — the physician selecting from his jiàngnáng (crimson medicine-bag) the essentials of his prescribing — is a programmatic gesture: the formulary represents not a comprehensive catalogue but a cuō (a pinch, a careful gathering) of the most-tested and most-reliable formulas. This contrasts with the encyclopedic Qīng popular formularies (e.g. KR3ed108 Yànfāng xīn biān’s 6,000 prescriptions) and aligns the Jiàngnáng cuōyào with the curated-selection genre of the Húmín jīngyàn lineage.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. The work survives in Qiánlóng and later Qīng printings; a modern punctuated edition is in the Zhōngyī gǔjí míngzhù cóngshū series.